Read Mystic and Rider (Twelve Houses) Online
Authors: Sharon Shinn
Mystic and Rider (Twelve Houses) (56 page)
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Kirra glanced at Donnal, so close, and Justin, too far away to hear. “If you’ll prop her up for me while I change her clothes—you have to promise to be a gentleman, though, and not look—I’ll make Donnal go sit somewhere else—”
In spite of everything, Tayse found himself grinning. “From what I’ve seen of the men of the Twelve Houses, being a gentleman doesn’t necessarily mean displaying great honor,” he said. “But I will turn my eyes away while you undress her.”
Donnal’s broad mouth widened into what had to be a lupine smile, but he rose to his four feet and trotted away from the fire. Kirra poured water into a pan and added a rag to soak. Then she leaned down and put her hands on either side of Senneth’s face.
“Sen. Are you awake? Sen? I want to clean you up a little, so we’re going to be moving you. If it gets too painful, let me know, and we’ll stop.”
“I’m—awake,” the whisper came back faintly.
Kirra’s face lit with delight. She clasped her hands to her chest like a little girl excited over a gift. “How are you feeling? Are you stronger? Do you hurt?”
“I feel—pretty bad,” Senneth replied. “My chest hurts.”
“That’s from the arrow,” Kirra said dryly.
“But—better than last night. A little.”
“Good. We’re going to clean you up, and then I’m going to try to feed you. All right?”
“All—right.”
“Tayse is going to help,” Kirra added inconsequentially.
Senneth turned her head slightly so she could see Tayse’s face, but she didn’t say anything. Kirra was quickly all business. “Tayse—if you’ll lift her up and brace her so that I can get this shirt off—good—”
It was a delicate and awkward maneuver, Tayse found, to strip a woman of her bloody clothing, and wipe her flesh clean, and bind a new bandage around her chest. He did only what Kirra told him, supporting Senneth’s weight against his chest, lifting her when instructed and then letting her settle back against him. Senneth remained more or less awake the entire time, for she gave little moans of pain now and then, and once whispered, “Thank you,” but she mostly kept her eyes closed and did not speak. Kirra moved swiftly and competently, leading Tayse to wonder how many of her nursing skills were magical and how many had been learned through training. Soon enough Senneth was in a fresh bandage and a clean shirt, lying against Tayse’s chest and taking slow, ragged breaths.
“Good. You’re still awake,” Kirra said, though Tayse could not see Senneth’s face to judge if her eyes were open. “Can you eat something? Some broth? At least drink some water?”
“I think so,” Senneth breathed.
Kirra leaned toward the fire to fetch a metal mug that had been heating all this time. “Just a little, just at first,” she said. “We’ll see how well you do.”
Also awkward was the act of feeding an invalid, because some of the soup sloshed from the spoon straight onto the clean shirt, and some of it dribbled down Senneth’s chin. But most of it went in her mouth, and Tayse could tell by Kirra’s expression that she was pleased.
“Now have some water and then we’ll let you lie down again,” she said, holding a container to Senneth’s mouth.
Tayse picked up one of the cleaner rags that Kirra had used to remove the blood from Senneth’s body. As soon as Kirra lowered the bottle, he started wiping at Senneth’s mouth and throat, chasing the droplets of broth down her neck and into the V of the fresh shirt. He had to push aside her gold amulet to clean the hollow of her throat. He could see a darker stain just below the top button, and he dabbed at it ineffectually, trying to reach it without compromising Senneth’s dignity.
“Did I leave a bloodstain?” Kirra asked, returning her attention to him. “Here—let me unbutton the shirt a little—”
And she did, and Tayse swiped at the blot again, but again it would not come off on the damp rag. He leaned closer to see what it might be—another wound, perhaps, that they had missed because of their focus on the arrow’s path—and saw a small, raised patch of reddish skin. It was positioned just above and perfectly between her breasts, exactly where a pendant might fall if Senneth were wearing jewelry for a formal ball.
It was a brand.
A housemark.
Tayse kept his eyes on the symbol of power and prestige while the world rocked around him like a shaken toy. He could feel Senneth’s weight against his shoulder, could feel the texture of the wet cloth in his hand. He knew that Kirra’s gaze had lifted from the housemark to his face and that Senneth’s own eyes were probably closed with resignation. But he could not move. He could not speak. He could not take it in.
A housemark. The brand of one of the Twelve Houses. She was one of the highest-ranking noblewomen in the country. He loved her and he did not want to love her, but it did not matter if he did or if he did not: She was not for him, never would have been, had he declared himself that night she kissed him or last night when she woke in his arms or at some point farther down the road when he was no longer able to keep his secret to himself.
He made himself lift his head and look at Kirra, whose face was a study in wretchedness and compassion. He found a moment to wonder why Senneth had bothered to lie about her heritage at all, though he supposed she’d had her reasons, but it was clear Kirra had known all along. Well, of course she would. Kirra, too, was a serramarra. They might have known each other since the day Kirra was born.
“Which House?” he managed to ask, his voice a rasp.
Kirra glanced down at Senneth, so Tayse followed her gaze. Senneth had twisted her head enough so that she could look up at him through her lashes. Her skin was absolutely white; her gray eyes showed only the faintest wash of color.
“Which House?” he repeated.
Senneth answered. “Brassenthwaite.”
CHAPTER 30
T
AYSE slept heavily till noon. He had thought, of course, that he would never sleep again—or else he would sleep forever, lie down on this crumpled blanket and close his eyes and then give over his spirit to whichever of the jealous gods chose to claim him. But, like any ordinary man, he slept for a few hours and then woke. He could not say that he felt any better for it. His body moved with the sluggishness that might come after secret poisoning. His heart beat with a listless rhythm, and his limbs responded with protest to his commands.
AYSE slept heavily till noon. He had thought, of course, that he would never sleep again—or else he would sleep forever, lie down on this crumpled blanket and close his eyes and then give over his spirit to whichever of the jealous gods chose to claim him. But, like any ordinary man, he slept for a few hours and then woke. He could not say that he felt any better for it. His body moved with the sluggishness that might come after secret poisoning. His heart beat with a listless rhythm, and his limbs responded with protest to his commands.
He had heard of men who were laid low by despair or grief, men who let bitter emotions rob their bodies of all strength. He had thought of them with some contempt, for who would ever be weak enough to be ruled by the passions of the heart? But he understood them all now. For the first time he believed that a man could be wounded even if no sword cut his chest, even if no arrow pierced his throat. He realized there were wounds to the soul that could fell even the strongest soldier.
He forced himself to his feet and walked around the fire to where Kirra sat and Donnal lay beside Senneth. “How is she?” he asked, and even to himself his voice sounded choked.
Kirra looked up at him. “Sleeping. But she ate some more a few hours ago, and I can feel the heat building up in her body. She’s getting stronger. She’ll recover fast, I think.”
He nodded. “What about you? I think you need to sleep, too.”
She nodded. “I will. After she wakes again and I feed her again.”
Justin came up from the land beyond the stream, a dead rabbit dangling from his hand. “Dinner,” he said with a grin. “Who needs wolves and raelynxes when he can set a trap?”
Tayse nodded at him. “Good. Now you sleep awhile. I’m up.” He glanced at the wolf, who had lifted his head from his paws and was regarding Tayse with a meditative stare. “You, too. Sleep.”
On the other side of the fire, Cammon was sitting up and yawning. “How’s Senneth?” he called.
“Better,” Tayse replied. “Time for our watch.”
Kirra waited till Donnal and Justin were settled and Cammon had trotted down to the river to wash up. Then she said to Tayse, “You can’t be angry with her for not telling you who she is.”
He shrugged, tired and in pain and not wanting to talk about it. “She owes me nothing. It is her right to tell me the story of her life, or not. How can it matter to me?”
“She was seventeen,” Kirra said in a hard, rapid voice. “Her father killed her son and threw her from the house. Because she was a mystic. My father would have taken her in—her mother’s relatives in Kianlever would have taken her in—Ariane Rappengrass offered her a home. But she wouldn’t stay. She just wandered off and—and—had that strange life she’s had. You’ve heard some of her stories. She doesn’t consider herself a Brassenthwaite anymore. She doesn’t claim to be from the Twelve Houses.”
“But she is,” Tayse said.
“No,” Kirra said. “She is Senneth. She is the greatest living mystic in Gillengaria. She has a wild power that she has brought under fierce control, and she has offered that power to the king. She is someone you can trust absolutely. Tayse, you’ve traveled at her side for six weeks. You know who she is. She hasn’t changed.”
He looked down at Senneth’s face, peaceful in sleep, brushed just now with the faintest blush of color. A good sign, that the fire was building again in her veins. “I never knew who she was,” he said. “And I haven’t changed either.”
THE next two days followed the same unvarying routine of sleeping and watching and tending to an invalid. Tayse took his turns acting as guard, tramping off to look for fuel, fetching water, cooking the meals. But there was no longer any need to help Kirra with Senneth, because Senneth was well enough now to sit on her own, feed herself, change her clothes if she needed to. Her temperature had risen back almost to its normal pitch, so not even Donnal needed to lie beside her at night to keep her body warm. Indeed, it would be only a day or two, Tayse guessed, before she would again command such reserves of heat that she would be able to light fires with her fingers and create whole temperate zones with her physical presence.
She didn’t need any of them, though only Tayse seemed to realize that. The others hovered around her, solicitous and affectionate by turns, made ridiculous with relief. There was a great deal of laughter around the campfire those two days, though Tayse himself did not laugh much. He was fairly certain there was no laughter left for him in the world.
The evening of that second day Senneth insisted on standing, and walking a small circle around the campfire, and then taking even more halting steps down to the edge of the stream. “I started out four days ago, hoping to get clean,” she said stubbornly, “and clean I will be. You men—go somewhere else. Kirra will help me.”
So he and Justin and Cammon and Donnal withdrew some distance, going up to the road to see if there had been much traffic recently. Cammon and Donnal faced in the direction of the convent, as if to sense or smell trouble that might come from that route, but neither of them had any observations to offer. Tayse’s own attention was fixed behind them, on the water, in case there should be a cry for help from a weak woman or a drowning one. But no voices called them back, and when they returned to the fire, Senneth and Kirra were sitting before it, damp and smiling.
“I think we should ride out tomorrow,” Senneth said.
“No,” Kirra replied.
“The day after, then,” Senneth said.
Kirra narrowed her eyes and looked at Senneth, as if considering. “Maybe. But we’d have to go slow.”
“We’ll set out the day after tomorrow,” Senneth repeated, and it was clear they would not be able to dissuade her. “So, Donnal, you should leave in the morning for Gisseltess to carry a message to Halchon. We can probably be in Lochau four or five days from now. Perhaps he can meet us then, or soon thereafter.”
Donnal nodded. “Will he come, do you think?”
Senneth stared somewhat moodily into the fire. “Yes. I think so.”
“Then I’ll be on my way in the morning.”
They had no paper with them, no writing implements—but Kirra was never at a loss in such situations. A broad, dry, winter leaf became a sheet of pressed paper; in her hands, a twig and a cup of water transformed to pen and ink. Frowning and writing very slowly, Senneth composed a letter to Halchon Gisseltess, then threw it in the fire.
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